Free The Pearl by John Steinbeck Page A

to dive for pearls, for there would be too much happening, too many things to see when Kino went to sell the great pearl.
    In the brush houses by the shore Kino’s neighbors sat long over their breakfasts, and they spoke of what they would do if they had found the pearl. And one man said that he would give it as a present to the Holy Father in Rome. Another said that he would buy Masses for the souls of his family for a thousand years. Another thought he might take the money and distribute it among the poor of La Paz; and a fourth thought of all the good things one could do with the money from the pearl, of all the charities, benefits, of all the rescues one could perform if one had money. All of the neighbors hoped that sudden wealth would not turn Kino’s head, would not make a rich man of him, would not graft onto him the evil limbs of greed and hatred and coldness. For Kino was a well-liked man; it would be a shame if the pearl destroyed him. “That good wife Juana,” they said, “and the beautiful baby Coyotito, and the others to come. What a pity it would be if the pearl should destroy them all.”
    For Kino and Juana this was the morning of mornings of their lives, comparable only to the day when the baby had been born. This was to be the day from which all other days would take their arrangement. Thus they would say, “It was two years before we sold the pearl,” or, “It was six weeks after we sold the pearl.” Juana, considering the matter, threw caution to the winds, and she dressed Coyotito in the clothes she had prepared for his baptism, when there would be money for his baptism. And Juana combed and braided her hair and tied the ends with two little bows of red ribbon,and she put on her marriage skirt and waist. The sun was quarter high when they were ready. Kino’s ragged white clothes were clean at least, and this was the last day of his raggedness. For tomorrow, or even this afternoon, he would have new clothes.
    The neighbors, watching Kino’s door through the crevices in their brush houses, were dressed and ready too. There was no self-consciousness about their joining Kino and Juana to go pearl selling. It was expected, it was an historic moment, they would be crazy if they didn’t go. It would be almost a sign of unfriendship.
    Juana put on her head shawl carefully, and she draped one long end under her right elbow and gather edit with her right hand so that a hammock hung under her arm, and in this little hammock she placed Coyotito, propped up against the head shawl so that he could see everything and perhaps remember. Kino put on his large straw hat and felt it with his hand to see that it was properly placed, not on the back or side of his head, like a rash, unmarried, irresponsible man, and not flat as an elder would wear it, but tilted a little forward to show aggressiveness and seriousness and vigor. There is a great deal to be seen in the tilt of a hat on a man. Kino slipped his feet into his sandals and pulled the thongs up over his heels. The great pearl was wrapped in an old soft piece of deerskin and placed in a little leather bag, and the leather bag was in a pocket in Kino’s shirt. He folded his blanket carefully and draped it in a narrow strip over his left shoulder, and now they were ready.
    Kino stepped with dignity out of the house, and Juana followed him, carrying Coyotito. And as they marched up the freshet-washed alley toward the town, the neighbors joined them. The houses belched people; the doorwaysspewed out children. But because of the seriousness of the occasion, only one man walked with Kino, and that was his brother, Juan Tomás.
    Juan Tomás cautioned his brother. “You must be careful to see they do not cheat you,” he said.
    And, “Very careful,” Kino agreed.
    “We do not know what prices are paid in other places,” said Juan Tomás. “How can we know what is a fair price, if we do not know what the pearl buyer gets for the pearl in another